Mauricio Pochettino

[MartyFunkhouser]

Everyone in the US I speak to is convinced that Belgium were just too much for them. And I keep telling them, they could have beaten Belgium. But the US players played like Spurs at the end of the Frank era. Heads had gone. Silly,

Hahahaha Behave............

 

[SissokoWasGood (BoL)]

Hahahaha Behave............

What exactly do you disagree with?

I think a fully motivated, locked in, confident US team without the controversy could have beaten a team that got taken to the wire by Senegal.

I also don’t think their issues were player quality or coaching. They made horrendous mistakes.

 

[MartyFunkhouser]

What exactly do you disagree with?

I think a fully motivated, locked in, confident US team without the controversy could have beaten a team that got taken to the wire by Senegal.

I also don’t think their issues were player quality or coaching. They made horrendous mistakes.

The link to Thomas Frank............give it a rest FFS

 

[SissokoWasGood (BoL)]

The link to Thomas Frank............give it a rest FFS

It really wasn’t a point about Thomas Frank, it was about a specific moment in time in the season. It reminded me of the Saudi Sportswashing Machine home game. The players heads had gone, and they were making schoolboy errors.

To be clear for any avoidance of doubt: I wasn’t trying to lure anyone in to a debate on Thomas Frank. I was trying to explain what I thought caused the US’s bad performance - political controversy that completely cut against the motivational theme that Poch has been repeating through the build up and in the tournament itself.

 

[MartyFunkhouser]

It really wasn’t a point about Thomas Frank, it was about a specific moment in time in the season. It reminded me of the Saudi Sportswashing Machine home game. The players heads had gone, and they were making schoolboy errors.

To be clear for any avoidance of doubt: I wasn’t trying to lure anyone in to a debate on Thomas Frank. I was trying to explain what I thought caused the US’s bad performance - political controversy that completely cut against the motivational theme that Poch has been repeating through the build up and in the tournament itself.

Cool

 

[Kandi1977]

They could have won if Balogun hadn't played, as he was a decent man and chose to serve his ban on the pitch

 

[glasgowspur]

Agreed, real shame. His whole thing was ‘Why not us?’. A carefully managed motivational theme that perfectly represented the hope and ambitions of an American people that always expect to win, while acknowledging they would be big underdogs. The political controversy completely soured it. M

Everyone in the US I speak to is convinced that Belgium were just too much for them. And I keep telling them, they could have beaten Belgium. But the US players played like Spurs at the end of the Frank era. Heads had gone. Silly, schoolboy mistakes. It wasn’t coaching, and it wasn’t quality. They just played completely within themselves. And I truly think the controversy impacted them, and that is such a shame. They became hated, with all that pressure, and they became political symbols.

It undos 2 years of careful work Poch put in to craft their culture and prepare them for this tournament. Inside, he must be seething. He’ll never say anything publicly to this effect because he seems way too pragmatic in his later years, but I’m sure this is what happened.

I've only seen the highlights but it reminded me of US ryder Cup teams, great while it went their way and collapse at the first sign of adversity.

 

[K.D.D.D.D.Soc]

I don't think its unreasonable to think USA could have beaten Belgium, on their they are good but they just beat Wales to qualify. England have frequently struggled to beat USA. The host played some good football in the tournament and raised expectations of their fans, I think the pressure of that expectation and the hostility towards them because of an incident they were not responsible for had a major effect on them. Their problem now is American fans have little sympathy for losers.